Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans….

Some little gems from the archives…..

Over the past few days I have been spending a good deal of my spare time archiving my collection. Collection you ask? Well, as most of my regular readers would know I have amassed a healthy appetite and collection of music, art and film memorabilia. This has all taken the best part of 21 years to build.

On Sunday morning I set about cataloging various concert and promotional posters. There are far too many to publish in one sitting just now though I wanted to start by sharing these three with you all for the time being.

First up is a mouthwatering item that Morrissey fans would dearly love to hang above their bed as I had done for more than a decade.

The Queen Is Dead hit Australian record shops in 1986. In due course it would stand alone as their most influential album, paving the way for Suede, Oasis, Blur, Radiohead and Gene to name a few. To help sales of the then new LP, Rough Trade sent a limited number of posters to Australian record shops in an effort to boost sales. They were not just ordinary size band posters. These ones were massive! At just on two metres in length this beautiful promotional poster has been in my collection since late 1993 when I picked it up at a local record fair.

Australian promotional poster for The Queen Is Dead LP

Sadly there is a rip at the top of the poster and a handful of small tears and nicks on the surface. Still, it sits proudly as one of my most treasured items of memorabilia.

Next in line is a genuine one of a kind. This item is one of the rarest in existence from David Bowie’s very first Australian tour in 1978. Promoting Bowie’s first Brisbane show, this item popped up in a sale bin at Rockaway Records back in 1994. It was marked at $10 and when I took it to the counter the stores owner realised a mistake had been made. A recently employed staff member had wrongly marked it for sale. It was apparently meant to be put aside for auction. Right place, right time I must say!

1978 Brisbane tour poster for Bowie’s first Lang Park concert

This particular Bowie show caused a stir when the QLD minister in charge of noise, Russ Hinze complained at the prospect of a noisy night for surrounding residents for the Milton, Bardon, Auchenflower and Paddington areas. The show went ahead and Bowie would return to Lang Park on his Serious Moonlight Tour in 1983. Tour posters from this era are hard to come by and at the time of writing I have never seen or heard of another poster from this show appearing in collectors circles.

My third item on show is another Bowie gem from his 1976 tour through Germany. Beginning in Munich before taking in stops at Dusseldorf, Berlin, Hamburg and two shows in Frankfurt during early to mid April, the Isolar Tour has gone down among many fans as Bowie’s crowning glory among his cannon of concert tours.

German tour poster from Bowie’s 1976 European leg.

I stumbled over this poster in a second hand record store in downtown Berlin some 10 years ago now. It has spent the past decade in well protected comfort and safe keeping however now it is in line to be framed and displayed for others to see.

There are many other tour and promotional posters stored away that in time will see the light of day from my collection. For now however I hope you enjoy these tasty treats from my personal archives.